A. Field of the Invention
The field of the present invention relates generally to systems and methods of quickly and effectively notifying others of an alert situation, including the presence of suspicious or dangerous activity, need for assistance and other emergency warnings. More particularly, the present invention relates to such systems and methods that are group-based, with such groups being based on a neighborhood, school, community or the like, for providing an alert notification to members of the group. Even more particularly the present invention relates to such systems and methods where a member of the group is able to notify others in his or her group of an alert situation.
B. Background
As populations and concentrations of population have increased, so has the occurrence of emergencies and the like that require notification of the proper authorities and of the citizens so they may effectively respond. For instance, virtually every community in the United States has a 911 emergency reporting system that allows members of the community to call a centralized call handling center to request, depending on the type of emergency, police, fire and/or ambulance assistance. These systems are configured to allow anyone, whether a member of the community or not, to be able to report an emergency from any telephone having a phone signal and being capable of dialing 911. When a 911 call is made, the caller explains the emergency to the operator, who then notifies the proper emergency response organization(s) so that they may send the necessary assistance. Most 911 systems have caller identification technology to enable the operator to call the caller if necessary and many 911 systems have the ability to identify the approximate location of a cellular telephone call. Despite the improved caller technology, 911 systems are generally configured to be an emergency call-in system where a citizen or other caller reports an emergency to the emergency operator as opposed to the authorities notifying members of the public of an emergency.
To notify members of the public of an emergency of which they should be aware, most communities rely on public broadcasting across television and radio stations. One example of use of such systems are the weather alerts that are broadcast by the National Weather Service (“NWS”) which is intended to notify persons of an approaching or existing severe storm, such as hail and/or tornado conditions. The government also has the ability to interrupt television and radio signals to transmit emergency information via the Emergency Broadcasting Network. While both of these systems are generally useful for notifying persons about an existing or pending emergency situation, they have the limitation that only persons who happen to have their television or radio on at the time of the emergency broadcast will receive the warning. In addition, many such alerts are not sufficiently geographically specific to the location where the listener is located, such that he or she may not know from the broadcast whether the threat is actually imminent or even applicable. For storm or other weather-related emergencies, the problem with having the television or radio on is solved by having emergency-specific radios that turn on when the receive a signal from the NWS. This type of emergency response system requires the purchase of a specific radio and is generally only applicable to weather-related emergencies and, as such, is not that commonly utilized outside of areas that commonly are affected by severe weather.
To compensate for the inability to notify persons of an emergency situation when they do not receive the information via television or radio, most communities either utilize a siren-type system or some form of personal notification. In certain areas of the country where storm-related emergencies are relatively common (i.e., tornado alley), most communities have an audible alarm system that loudly broadcasts a siren to warn persons that a severe storm is approaching and that they should take cover immediately. While this type of system is useful for warning of a single, specific type of emergency, it is generally not suitable for warning of general emergencies. For instance, in areas subject to severe storms or wildfire conditions the proper public response is likely opposite, such as take cover versus flee immediately. As such, siren-based alert systems are generally not suitable for warning a community, or some segment of the community, of a general emergency situation. In order to selectively warn persons of the need to stay inside their house, office, school or other building, such as in the situation of a nearby chemical spill or a criminal or wild animal on the loose, or the need to evacuate the area due to a wildfire, potential dam failure or poisonous chemical spill, communities generally rely on personal notification of persons in the buildings. This is generally achieved by sending a police car or fire truck into the neighborhoods with a loud speaker broadcasting a message telling the public to take the appropriate action or by sending police or fire personnel door-to-door. In addition to not being a very time efficient manner of notifying public of an immediate danger or threat, it also places the emergency personnel in harms way by requiring them to be combing the neighborhoods as a dam is failing, a wildfire is approaching, a deadly chemical cloud is in the area or the like.
Over the years, various systems and methods have been developed to improve the ability of notifying the proper persons of an alert. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 7,194,249 to Phillips describes a system of providing urgent public information that comprises receiving an alert message from at least one alert source, such as a device or public entity, and then transmitting the alert to at least one subscriber via a communication network. The alert receiver is configured to analyze the alert information to determine whether a particular subscriber should receive the alert. U.S. Pat. No. 6,509,833 to Tate describes a method and system for providing a warning alert to the subscribers of a telecommunication system who reside and/or are located in a certain geographic area. U.S. Publication No. 2003/0022684 to Seeger and U.S. Pat. No. 6,745,021 to Stevens also describe systems and methods of notifying telephone or wireless subscribers of a broadcast alert based on a list of subscribers who are in the relevant geographical area. U.S. Pat. No. 7,071,821 to Adamczyk describes a method and system of notifying persons who are on a subscriber's emergency notification list based on an automated process or those persons who are geographically nearest the subscriber, based on GPS technology, when he or she sends the alert message.
One significant problem with all presently available emergency alert notification systems is that they do not facilitate the localized reporting of an alert and then the rapid distribution of that alert, with details as to the nature of the alert, to the persons most likely to need to know about the alert. As an example, if a person sees a suspicious character in his or her neighborhood who may or may not actually be committing a crime, but is nonetheless acting suspiciously, there is generally not much he or she can do to notify others in the neighborhood of the danger possibly presented by the character. Although the person who sees the character could call 911 and request the police to respond to check out the character, this could be too late to help the next door neighbor who would have otherwise benefitted from a warning and locked their door. Ideally, the person seeing such a character would know the name and telephone number of each of his or her neighbors and could call them to personally warn them of the character so that the neighbors may take whatever action they feel appropriate (i.e., call their children into the house and lock the doors). The reality of modern living is, however, that most people do not even know their neighbors all that well and do not have the telephone number (if even their name) of all of the neighbors who could be affected. In addition, it would generally take too much time to call each neighbor and then explain to them the situation for it to be of any immediate alert benefit. The ability of one neighbor to notify each of his or her neighbors of an alert situation is applicable to a wide variety of emergency type of situations determined by the first neighbor, including criminals, wild animals and the like, as well as to passing on information obtained from a public broadcast on the television or radio, thereby notifying others who may not have theirs on at the time the emergency message is broadcast.
In addition to neighbor on neighbor alert notifications, an emergency alert notification system would also be useful for a wide variety of groups that can benefit from shared information. For instance, persons who all work in the same general building or location and persons who children go to the same school could benefit from shared emergency alert notifications. As an example, if there was an emergency lockdown at a school due to shooting or other event, it would be beneficial to be able to quickly, accurately and efficiently notify the parents so that they can be aware of the situation and, if necessary, make arrangements to come get their child or children. The current process for a parent to find out such information is via the news on a public television or radio broadcast, from a friend or relative who hears about the situation, or from their child or the school after the situation has already been resolved, all of which either rely on some amount of luck or are generally not acceptable.
What is needed, therefore, is a new system and method for an alert notification system that allows one or more members of a group, such as a neighborhood group, to quickly, efficiently and effectively notify other members of the group of an alert situation, such as an emergency or potential emergency. Such a system and method should be suitable for use by a variety of groups, including neighborhood-based groups, school-based groups, business districts, work location or building-based groups and communities. Preferably, such a system and method would be configured as a subscriber system wherein one subscriber initiates the alert message describing the alert situation in sufficient detail to such that other subscribers who receive the alert message will know what the situation is and how best to respond. As a subscriber-based system, the method of using the alert notification system should include one or more steps to verify that the alert initiator is a legitimate member of a subscriber group prior to transmitting the alert message to other members of the initiator's group.